Welcome to Medical News Today

Healthline Media, Inc. would like to process and share personal data (e.g., mobile ad id) and data about your use of our site (e.g., content interests) with our third party partners (see a current list) using cookies and similar automatic collection tools in order to a) personalize content and/or offers on our site or other sites, b) communicate with you upon request, and/or c) for additional reasons upon notice and, when applicable, with your consent.

Healthline Media, Inc. is based in and operates this site from the United States. Any data you provide will be primarily stored and processed in the United States, pursuant to the laws of the United States, which may provide lesser privacy protections than European Economic Area countries.

By clicking “accept” below, you acknowledge and grant your consent for these activities unless and until you withdraw your consent using our rights request form. Learn more in our Privacy Policy.

Please accept our privacy terms

We use cookies and similar technologies to improve your browsing experience, personalize content and offers, show targeted ads, analyze traffic, and better understand you. We may share your information with third-party partners for marketing purposes. To learn more and make choices about data use, visit our Advertising Policy and Privacy Policy. By clicking “Accept and Continue” below, (1) you consent to these activities unless and until you withdraw your consent using our rights request form, and (2) you consent to allow your data to be transferred, processed, and stored in the United States.

Dysentery May Be Treatable With Cheap Arthritis Drug

US researchers have discovered that an already approved arthritis drug may offer a cheap, low-dose treatment for the amoebic infections
that cause dysentery in humans worldwide. So far they have only tested the drug in lab and animal studies, but they have applied for
approval to start clinical trials to test it as a treatment for both amebiasis and the parasite Giardia in humans.

The researchers, from University of California - San Diego (UCSD), and University of California - San Francisco (UCSF), write about their
findings in the 20 May online issue of Nature Medicine.

The antirheumatic drug is called auranofin, marketed as ridaura, and is a form of the precious metal gold.

The researchers were screening already approved drugs to find new treatments for the developing world when they made their discovery.

Co-senior author James McKerrow is a professor of pathology at UCSF's Sandler Center for Drug Discovery. He told the press:

"When we're looking for new treatments for the developing world, we start with drugs that have already been approved."

Using a high-throughput drug screen he and his colleagues found that auranofin was 10 times more potent against the parasite
Entamoeba histolytica than the current treatment metronidazole.

They said their study illustrates the importance of screening existing drugs for new purposes, especially for neglected diseases.

McKerrow said that the combination of an off-patent drug and decades of clinical safety data means we may have a global lower-cost
solution, with fewer side effects or risks of bacterial resistance, than the current therapy.

Every year, 50 million people around the world, most in developing countries, contract amebiasis, a gastrointestinal infection by the
parasite Entamoeba histolytica that causes symptoms ranging from mild diarrhea to dysentery with blood and mucus in the stool.

The infection spreads through contaminated food and water, and kills around 70,000 people a year, with children being the ones most
likely to become severely ill.

The parasite Giardia also infects 6-8% of all children in developing countries, causing diarrhea, abdominal cramps and dehydration.

The current treatment for both amebiasis and giardiasis is the antibiotic metronidazole, whose side effects include nausea, vomiting,
dizziness and headache.

Auranofin has been used as a twice-daily tablet for adults with rheumatoid arthritis since 1985, and has been shown to be safe at that
dosage.

Because the study's lab and animal test findings show auranofin is 10 times more potent that the current therapy, they suggest it could be
effective at a low dose, perhaps even on a one-time or limited basis.

First author Anjan Debnath is a postdoctoral fellow at UCSF. He said:

"This is a drug that you can find in every country. Based on the dosage we're seeing in the lab, this treatment could be sold at about
$2.50 per dose, or lower. That cost savings could make a big difference to the people who need it the most."

Debnath is a member of McKerrow's team at UCSF. They focus on infectious diseases in the developing world that are not research
priorities for pharmaceutical companies.

The team set out to create a screen to find small molecule drugs that would kill amoebas safely. One key breakthrough came when
Debnath developed a high-throughput screen that could test the molecules in an oxygen-free, or anaerobic, environment, to mimic the
amoeba's natural environment.

Another key breakthrough was from a company going out of business. Iconix Biosciences, of Menlo, California, offered the team its
screening library of 900 approved compounds, each in its own vial.

After testing auranofin in the lab, the researchers then tested it in two animal studies. One test was in a mouse model of amebiasis in the
colon, which is where the parasite first takes hold, and the other was in a hamster model that shows the impact of infection in the liver.

In both animal studies, the team said auranofin was the most effective drug they had ever seen. At very low doses it markedly reduced
the number of parasites, inflammation damage and the size of liver abscesses.

Armed with this "proof of principle", Debnath has applied to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to grant auranofin Orphan Drug
Status. This is a way of fast-tracking new drugs that show promise in treating a neglected or orphan disease (ie one that affects fewer
than 200,000 people in the US, or one that is not expected to recover the development and marketing cost).

"Because auranofin has already been approved by the FDA for use in humans, we can save years of expensive development."

"This new use of an old drug represents a promising therapy for a major health threat, and highlights how research funded by the
National Institutes of Health can benefit people around the world," she added.

2019 Healthline Media UK Ltd. All rights reserved. MNT is the registered trade mark of Healthline Media. Any medical information published on this website is not intended as a substitute for informed medical advice and you should not take any action before consulting with a healthcare professional.